Instabase raises $100M to help companies process unstructured document data

Instabase, a company that creates software for extracting processing unstructured data from myriad document types, has raised $100 million in a Series D round of funding.

The announcement comes as companies struggle under a deluge of data — data that can unlock key business insights. Indeed, most of the data that companies generate is “unstructured,” that is, it doesn’t have any predefined labelling — this could be plain text contained within PDFs, image files, or emails.

By deploying Instabase, businesses can extract, classify, and analyze data from any document — this could be to help re-route correspondence to the right department, for example. They can also apply generative AI to this data, allowing anyone to ask questions or request summaries or insights from across their vast document stores.

The San Francisco-based startup has amassed a number of high-profile customers since its inception in 2015, including Uber, Natwest, AXA, the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO), and “four of the five largest U.S. banks.”

Historically, Instabase was one of numerous document processing automation companies that used more rules-based techniques to extract and process data. With the advent of the modern AI era, including natural language processing (NLP) and generative AI, such systems are capable of handling far more complex data types.

“As we progress through the AI age, companies cannot realize their AI capabilities without first harnessing and learning from the unstructured data that lives within every organization,” Instabase founder and CEO Anant Bhardwaj (pictured above) said in a statement.

Prior to now, Instabase had raised around $175 million in funding, including a $45 million Series C round in 2023, valuing the startup at $2 billion.

The company’s Series D round was led by Qatar’s sovereign wealth fund, the Qatar Investment Authority (QIA), with participation from big-name existing investors including Andreessen Horowitz, Greylock Partners, Index Ventures, and NEA. The company didn’t reveal a fresh valuation.